Michigan State University (MSU) in East Lansing, Michigan, hosts numerous international students and visiting scholars each academic year. International students from more than 130 countries compose approximately 10 percent of MSU's student population. More than 5,050 international students and scholars attended MSU in fall 2009, and more than 1,000 of them lived in on-campus residence halls and apartments. Emergency response and pandemic planning concerns on campus several years ago pushed MSU to prepare for a potential need to close residence halls.
Higher Education
Pandemic Influenza and Higher Education
During the 2009 H1N1 outbreak, the University of Iowa (UI) University Housing developed a program to provide students with nutritious food if they were too ill to leave their on-campus rooms. Ill students could fill out an online "Isolation Meal Pack Request" package containing three meals. Meals could be delivered or picked up by a friend, and meal plans were charged for two meals if the package of food was delivered and charged for one meal if the package was picked up at one of the UI Marketplaces. The meal pack contained enough food for lunch, dinner, and breakfast the next day.
Although the University of Illinois was able to send many H1N1-infected students home to recover with their parents, an on-campus option was needed. Illinois has among the most international students of any college campus in the United States, said Jim Rooney, EDD, Associate Director of Housing. More than 2,700 of those students are undergraduates, who tend to live on campus.
The 2009 H1N1 pandemic flu outbreak forced the University of Chicago to make immediate housing plans after the flu virus was first identified in California and Mexico. So, when H1N1 hit in 2009, two things happened that influenced their response strategy immediately, said Dr. Kristine Bordenave, director of the Student Care Center (SCC): One, the university had one of the first H1N1 infections in the nation, a hospital staff member; and two, the timing of the academic year.
During the H1N1 pandemic, the University of Michigan developed policies and practices around provision of alcohol-free hand sanitizer. In April 2009, the University of Michigan was planning for its spring graduation ceremonies. Planners realized that students' families from all over the nation and world would be visiting during graduation. The celebration provided an opportunity for extensive flu transmission on campus, said Robert Winfield, MD, Director of the University Health Service and Chief Health Officer at the University of Michigan.
Parents were considered an important stakeholder group for communications during the H1N1 response at the University of Illinois. As part of the outreach to parents, Dr. David Lawrance, Medical Director at McKinley Health Center, wrote letters for an electronic newsletter that is distributed to up to 20,000 parents of Illinois students. The letters "had a tremendous reach and kept parental complaints down to a very small number. They were well-informed and got these compelling letters," said Robert Palinkas, MD, Director of McKinley Health Center.
Although the University of Illinois did not need to stand up its Emergency Operations Center (EOC) or Incident Command Post (ICP) for the H1N1 pandemic, the school had a plan in place that would have allowed that to happen quickly.
In a time of extensive budget and program cuts, many universities were also hit hard by the financial costs of the H1N1 pandemic. Health departments generally provided H1N1 and seasonal influenza vaccine at no cost to institutions of higher education. However, colleges and universities bore the financial burden of other response efforts, such as communications campaigns, equipment and supplies for vaccine clinics, and costs associated with isolating ill students.
In spring 2009, at the start of the H1N1 influenza pandemic, an H1N1 Committee was formed at the University of Toledo (UT) in Ohio. Committee members quickly recognized two valuable resources in the fight against pandemic influenza: students and community partnerships.
Conducting mass H1N1 vaccination at Michigan State University (MSU)-one of the Big 10 universities-required thoughtful planning. A population of approximately 47,000 students, an unpredictable supply of vaccine, and national guidelines that changed frequently all contributed to a complex vaccine distribution strategy.
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